Thursday, June 05, 2008

Oh boy, here they come with more band-aids. "Dude, but did you know I have malaria?!"

You see, its like a feedzone in a long hilly road race on a hot hot day.

Your water bottles are empty and someone hands you a cold drink after 70 miles of painful work. You go another 10 more, and you're still tired, managing a snail's 10mph pace.

Well, turns out the big underlying problem is not thirst, its fatigue! Your urine was a weird shade of brown this morning, arrhythmic heart beats are putting bad techno music to shame, the legs are like powerless twigs in a 90mph gust, and your tongue seems like the drought ridden soil of Somalia.

Basically, you are going to die so get off the damn bike already.

Or.. its like a thick and mercilessly wrapped handlebar tape to solve your wrists' accumulating problems, when the fundamental fitting technique you used on the bike in the first place was completely flawed.

An economy will continue in its constant state of downward motion until and unless acted upon by intelligent people to solve fundamental problems. Or so, said Issac Newton back in the 16th century.

"Heh, I'll give you money, keep the spending (up)"

But anyway, being an ass aside, you have to be somewhat grateful to this rare generosititation extended by the governmentation.

So I wondered how cyclists could potentially stimulate themselves when this stimulation check hits home.

For the time being, here's a small list with some of my favorite picks.

1. RIDING STIMULATOR

For a couple jointly filing for the 1000+ dollars or so, there's nothing more stimulating than purchasing one of these stimulators.

By nature, the system is a simulator but by evil nature, it is also a stimulator. More to the point, it stimulates you to stay indoors indefinitely.

The computer menu displays a surprisingly wide array of virtual scenarious for the cycling aficionado to pick from.

You can click a button to go for a mild touring ride or another one for a heavy backpack on your back saddle pack on your saddle kind of brevet if you fancy being a randonneur.

And there's another choice to race in a noob cat 5 field for fun or a serious men's pro 1/2 field for the kicks. Whats more, you can even practice commuting to the nearest grocery store just 2 digital miles away, working on what most coaches fancily term "BIKE HANDLING SKILLS".

Do this 3-4 times during the winter season and you'll not only be a noticeably good bike handler, you will also virtually attain all the computer skills necessary to fill up that scanty resume, which you can then show to a potential cycling sponsor.

Top all this with choices to stimulate/annoy digital weather patterns and you've got yourself either an easy fresh ride at the crack of dawn or a breezy hell-o-va ride in a 24 mph head wind, although I have no idea where the actual wind comes from, front or back.

Now some may jump in saying that its precisely due to the Stimulator and the opportunistic Cyclepassion bike calender that more and more male cyclists are increasingly being found less and less on the road.

But hey, what have they got to lose?

Look at the pluses. They're getting their training, they're more at home, they're closer to their wives and kids, and generally, they're imposing lesser rage on motorists this way.

This is why, gentleriders, that this was my first pick.

2. MUSCLE STIMULATOR

Engineering problem : Cyclist is dum and lazy. Not working out, no passion for the sport, not riding enough, not getting the hours in, putting on tons of weight in winter.

Engineering solution : Feed him electricity.

"What?? But he is an electric personality..."

"No not that kind of electric. Pour large amounts of actual electricity into the body."

"For what?"

"To recruit stubborn muscles."

"Forcefully?"

"Yes, painfully."

"You mean like force recruiting of soldiers?"

"Exactly like force recruiting of soldiers."

"Sounds like Republicans."

"Yes, the inventor is a Republican."

So then friends, if laziness is your problem and if you are a Republican, invest in force recruiting all those hidden muscle fibres.

Coaches talk about hidden potential.

Turns out they don't even know what they're talking about.

So want summm?

Give them.

Shock and awe.

Else, muscles will turn into disloyal stewards and turn your body upside down, bringing poor performance and quickly and effectively turning you into a non-cyclist.

Besides, look at the bright side. You can always boast to that "tough" friend down the road who climbs 10,000 ft every weekend - "Hey, I can go through more pain than you and in less time just sitting in the comfort of home. Beat that."

Sounds like those TV based home business commercials if you just substitute "pain" with "money".

3. CLOTHING STIMULATOR

Perhaps only clothing companies have come to recognize the near naked experience that is cycling and sympathetically give them more to wear.

But some want to further improve on the nakedness.

Enter the state-of-the-art compression tights and shorts.

For a less than hefty amount that your stimulus check can easily cover, you can now get these textile gizmos to further enhance your nakedness.

Believe it or not, in recent studies conducted by the Colorado Olympic Central Board of Non-Cyclists, these apparel, besides increasing weight and giving a bulkier look to the emaciated cyclist, were also found to yield superhuman powers to the wearer, specifically in terms of lactic acid buffermentation.

Yes, you heard right.

Preliminary Verdict : No more will you lactate like a helpless toddler.

Furthermore, the non-cyclist committee didn't do any test studies on subjects actually on bikes.

Instead, 90% of the testees sat in airplanes during long distance travel.Enhanced Verdict : No more will you lactate like a helpless toddler in an airplane, while traveling across the atlantic to a tough cyclocross race in Belgium.

As for the other test subjects, a joint squad from the apparel and non-cyclist industries invaded a Masai community in a secluded area of Tanzania and found that the tribesmen jumped remarkably higher with compression shorts. This took care of the rest 10% of test subjects.

FINAL VERDICT : If you're among those who spent too much time flying to races or over the handlebars.....or even happen to jump a lot excitedly in bike shops, add these shorts to your shopping cart!!!

They will surely increase your performance in jump flying and make this an exciting year for you.